


Alight

by CorvidFeathers



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Philosophical Discussion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-14
Updated: 2013-10-14
Packaged: 2017-12-29 09:25:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1003740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CorvidFeathers/pseuds/CorvidFeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Enjolras and Jehan have a discussion about liberty and death</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alight

“I hope it will be glorious,” Jehan said dreamily, his eyes focused on something far beyond the limits of the ceiling he was staring at. “No… not glorious. Glory is a word too often blackened by the words of politicians, speaking of their careers, of what people will write of them when they are long dead, without a thought to the impact of what they do today. To be immortalized in legend is one version of immortality… but to die to change for the change that must come, that is an even greater form of immortality.”

Enjolras sighed patiently, shaking his head slightly. He did not give much thought towards his death- if it were to happen in the fight for the liberty of France and its people, so be it. He had brushed fingers with death before, but had no intention of spending time staring it down until that moment came. He would neither shy from it nor embrace it.

But Jehan was fascinated by the polarity of the world, the flowers and spring and rot and death. The final death rattle of some wild animal held the same allure to him as the pattern of the clouds did, and neither would draw Enjolras’ attention. It was a fascination he himself did not understand, but sometimes when he saw the poet in full swing Enjolras could feel a brush of that wondrous energy that Jehan found in all of the goings-on of the world, great and small.

Musing about his own death, however, was not something Enjolras liked to hear Jehan talk about. He was the youngest of their group, and Enjolras sometimes fell upon that fact uncomfortably. The Amis, though not all at the age of majority, were of an age they could take care of themselves. Enjolras could always rely on them. But there were fleeting moments when Enjolras felt nearly… protective of them, and this was one such with Jehan.

He, Bahorel, and Jehan had been meeting with the leader of another group seemingly much like their own, but in reality just a farce to root out possible malcontents. They had all managed to escape, and Enjolras was reasonably certain that none of the gendarmes had gotten a good look at any of them, but that was a hollow victory in the face of what he had believed they had won. 

Bahorel had escaped unharmed, but Enjolras had been concussed and Jehan had received a bayonet to the side. They had limped back to Combeferre’s apartment, and Combeferre had patched them up before rushing off with Bahorel to make sure that the others were safe and informed. If Combeferre had been willing to leave him, it was reasonably sure that Jehan’s wound was relatively minor, but laudanum and bloodloss had left him rambling an delirious.

“I hope you’ll die an unpoetic death, at a very old age,” Enjolras said suddenly. Jehan looked up at him through clouded eyes.

“You’re not one to stand for bourgeois ideals,” he scoffed.

Enjolras smiled. “Is it a bourgeois ideal? The opportunity for better lives for those who are denied them is what we are fighting for.”

Jehan shrugged carelessly. “We fight for liberty, for equality, for things that others are denied. I’d rather stay as far away from a oligarchic existence as possible.” He shook his head. "We already possess the means to leave the ideal of a bourgeois life. I’ll offer up that to the gods, like the offerings of the Greeks. At the shrine of… Athena. Take the years that I might live a bourgeois life and exchange them for freedoms in France. Offer that to your patron god.”

Enjolras shook his head, bemused. “You’re not making any sense, my friend.”

“Wasn’t it Athena?” Jehan eyed him blearily. “Warlike and… beautiful. Born from knowledge.”

Enjolras had not been as attentive to his classical education as Jehan or Grantaire, and only had a vague idea of what Jehan was rambling about. Jehan didn’t seem to mind. He lifted his head carefully and moved over, one hand to his side, to rest his head in Enjolras’ lap. 

Enjolras drew his fingers through Jehan’s hair absentmindedly, looking at the light filtering through the window. His mind had already gone to the damage that the night had done, to the other groups that warnings would have to be sent to. He and Jehan would have to actually show up at class as soon as possible, in case the gendarmes were smart enough to pick through the missing students for the ones they might have wounded. It was a long shot, but they could not afford to be arrested now. Not when things were still so new and fragile.

“Do you suppose you’ll grow old?” Jehan said softly, snapping him out of his planning.

“I don’t know,” Enjolras said reflexively, and then paused to think. He could not imagine taking a wife from the families of which his families approved, and settling down to use his license in law to steal property from the poor and cheat men out of their honest wages. That was what growing old was, from the example of their parents and their parents’ parents, and the revolutionaries preceding them. Lafayette had returned from the American Revolution and spent the rest of his life trying to keep a king on the throne.

Enjolras could feel nothing for his own future, a future like that, only the fire for the future of mankind. 

He looked down at Jehan, sprawled comfortably in his lap. His skin was shades paler than healthy, making the dusting of freckles on his nose stand out more sharply. His large gray eyes stared back at Enjolras, clouded, but full of life and fire and hope.

He could not picture Jehan growing old either, as much as he suddenly wanted to.

He was too alight with the hope of the future.

Enjolras pushed this thought away, closing his eyes for a moment. Something warm touched his cheek, brushing away the sudden trickle of tears, and when he opened his eyes again Jehan was smiling.


End file.
